Newsie Other Half
by Inky1
Summary: Six girls escape from a cruel foster home to find themselves in Manhattan. Now they want to join the band of newsies, but since they are girls Jack and his group won't let them join. This is the story of what they do to earn their title as newsies.
1. Default Chapter

I looked around the busy street of this new and strange city. It had only been three days since we had all escaped, but none of us had gotten much sleep since we were all so nervous of being caught again. Our escape had been practically a miracle, and there must have been a search party made not two hours after we had left. Would there be someone in this town looking for us? All the way over here in Manhattan?  
  
My mind was riddled with questions and worries. There was just the six of us, and we had no place to go. What were we going to do?  
  
A loud voice came bellowing through the streets, calling some headline about the attempted murder of the major's cousin. I grinned to myself, knowing that in truth, the major's cousin had probably tripped and scratched his knee or something like that. The sound of the headlines being called out by that boy reminded me of the year before I had been put into that foster home. I had been a newsie myself in that one year, as had most of us who were put into the foster home. All of my friends had been.  
  
That's when the idea hit. I smiled with relief, and went to look for the boy who had called out the headline. It wasn't hard to find him. He had a pointed face and his light brown hair was slicked back with some cheap hair grease. He wore a ridiculous looking cowboy hat around his neck. Well, at least he would be easy to keep track of. As he sold his last paper he went off at a slow pace talking every now and then to some other random boy that he met along the way. They were probably his fellow newsies. A few in particular stood out to me, one with blonde hair and an eye patch, one with black hair with a cigar in his mouth, and one with curly brown hair. I watched as he talked to all of them for a few minutes, and then finally we ended up at a building with a sign that said NEWSBOYS LODGING HOUSE. I looked carefully at the building and then headed back the way I had come. Finally we might have something go right since our escape.  
  
* * *  
  
When I arrived at the meeting place we chose only three of the girls were there. They all smiled and said hello, even though I had only been gone a few hours. We were all like sisters, and we had all suffered the same fate at the foster home. I turned to Lashes, a girl my age, about 14, with straight blonde hair and hazel eyes, like my own, that were shadowed by her thick long eyes lashes.  
  
"Did you guys find anything out about the foster home? Are they gonna come looking here in Manhattan for us?"  
  
She smiled sadly at me and said, "No we couldn't find out anything besides that they didn't notice we were gone until the next morning."  
  
At that we all smiled. We had hoped that we would have a few hours to run as far as we could without them noticing our absence, but all night!!!! That at least was some good news.  
  
"Well I've got some news too. I think I may have found a place for us to stay, and a way to get some income as well."  
  
"How?" asked Rae as she and Hades came back from their search for food. Now all of us were here. With Lashes, Singah, Rabbit, Rae, Hades, and me there were six of us. We all started walking as I explained what I had seen and how I had followed the boy to the lodging house. They all caught on to my idea immediately.  
  
"Of course! We were all newsies before we came to the foster home, why can't we be newsies again?" Singah pointed out. She, like Lashes, had blonde hair, although hers was curly and slightly longer. She had ice blue eyes and was known for her beautiful voice. Thus the name Singah.  
  
"So all we have to do is go to the lodging house and ask if we can join." Said Lashes.  
  
"It probably won't be that easy. Boy newsies are known for being sexiest towards girls who want to be newsies." That was Rabbit. She didn't say much, but when she did it always had wisdom behind it. She was a little shy of strangers, and the foster home hadn't helped that. The foster home hadn't helped any of us.  
  
"We'll just have to make them see our point then won't we?" said Hades. She was completely different from Rabbit in that she was outgoing and didn't like it when people told her she couldn't do something. She was known for causing trouble.  
  
We all grinned at that, some of us nervously, some of us mischievously. We would see what the boy newsies said, and only after that could we decide what to do next. Silently we walked into the growing dusk and headed toward the lodging house. 


	2. chapter 2

It was easy to find the lodging house since I had taken careful notice of the name of the street. It was a rickety old building, but not any worse than what we had come from, so it didn't matter.  
  
We entered and found it to be full of newsies from all ages. It was Rae who spoke up first.  
  
"Who's the leader around here?" Before she had said that none of the boys had taken much notice of us, but now they were all silently staring at us. It was the boy with the cowboy hat that I had seen earlier that day who spoke up next.  
  
"I'm da leader of the Manhattan newsies. What do ya want?"  
  
"I'm Rae Kelly and these are me friends. We wanna join your gang."  
  
At this the boy raised his eyebrows, "My name is Kelly. Jack Kelly. I don't appreciate other people copying my style, and no you can't join our gang. Girls can't be newsies." By now all the other boy newsies had started talking amongst themselves and a few nodded their heads at what that boy Jack had said. Right about now was when the trouble started.  
  
"Who says girls can't be newsies?! Any one of us could sell ten times better than twenty of you put together!" Hades yelled. That was when she jumped at Jack and socked him in the stomach. He keeled over and then about five of his friends jumped at Hades. That didn't fly well with the rest of us. In one instant Rae and I pulled and kicked the boys off of Hades, while Lashes, Rabbit, and Singah held the other boys off. At that we decided the 6 of us didn't stand much of a chance against 30 of them for very long. We fought our way to the door, punching and scratching along the way. As we left the lodging house Hades yelled at the top of her lungs "You haven't' heard the last of us Cowboy!!!! We'll make sure you regret ever being born!!!"  
  
With that we left, none of us the worse for wear, but leaving a good few bruises behind us. Hades was right in what she said, from that point on the boys were gonna regret ever denying us of being newsies. 


	3. chapter 3

Author's note: thanx to all the people who review my story!!!!!! I feel so loved ::sniffs:: I promise that the next few chps will be full of action. Hehe, if there's anyone in particular that anyone would like to soak, just tell me and it shall be done.  
  
Disclaimer: none of the original newsies belong to me, they belong to Disney; in fact, only the inky character belongs to me. All the girl newsies belong to themselves (or their bf's, whichever comes first).  
  
Thanx again -Inky  
  
The next morning was quite eventful. After buying a few loaves of bread with our scant remaining money we ate and started off. In which direction you can probably guess. We were headed towards the dealer's office. Even though we weren't offical newsies we could still sell papes. We were there before the gates opened, so we had a little time to spare: a little time to plan our thanks for the little scuffle the night before.  
  
"They are sorely wrong if they think that we will take an insult like that sitting down," Lashes raged. Because of the boys' rejection we had had to spend yet another night sleeping on the streets. None of us were in a good mood seeing as it had rained that night.  
  
"Yeah, we'll show those jerks what they've gotten themselves into." I was looking forward to it too.  
  
Rabbit grinned, "If they won't give us what we want, we'll just have to take it, now won't we?" We were all startled by the familiar voice that came from nowhere.  
  
"You guys aren't planning trouble without me are ya?" We all turned around at that and were thrilled and shocked to see another of the girls from the foster home. It was Half-pint. Her dark red hair shone in the morning sun, and her dark eyes gleamed with pleasure at our surprise.  
  
"Half!!!" We all screamed at once. "Half what are ya doing here?" "Half, it's so good to see you!!!" She laughed as we fired our questions and greeting at her.  
  
"I was able to get away the same way you guys had, but I was just a little late in coming. I was able to follow you guys here and it wasn't hard to find you what with all those annoying boys grumbling about a band of obnoxious girls."  
  
The day seemed to get better after that. We were able to sell all of our papes, and each of us had gotten at least 50. We had a little money in our pockets, so we decided to put our plan into action that very day.  
  
Because we had finished selling early we had just enough time to get to the lodging house a few minutes before the boys. The old man who ran the building wasn't there, he must have been out getting his dinner somewhere, we didn't really care. So we locked the doors. Like Rabbit had said, if they weren't gonna give us what we wanted, we would just have to take it. And we wanted a home.  
  
It wasn't long before the first of the newsie boys started showing up. At first they didn't really pay attention to the locked door, they just shrugged and walked off. But, as the minutes wore on a few of them started pounding on the doors.  
  
"Hey Kloppman, open up!!" said the black haired boy who had a cigar in his mouth.  
  
"Yeah, Kloppman, what's the holdup?" It was the Jack Kelly boy again.  
  
"You guys looking for Kloppman? Well, he ain't here right now, and probably won't be here for a long time." Hades called as she leaned out of a window of the bunkrooms.  
  
The fun started then. Half of the boys started jumping around and pounding on the doors. The others just stared blankly at Hades not understanding what was going on.  
  
"Let us in ya tramps!!" roared a blonde boy about age 16. It was the one I had seen talking with Jack the day before. He had an eye patch on his right eye.  
  
Rae didn't take too kindly to that comment (really none of us did). That's when she turned to us and said rather loudly so that the boys outside could hear "Gee girls, if this place is gonna be our home I think that we should do a little cleaning to get rid of the junk that's in the place."  
  
"I agree," Singah snickered as she watched Rae start throwing the first of the boys' possessions out if the window. After that it was a free-for-all of grabbing the things inside the lodging house that lay strewn on the floor, and tossing at the window. At this the boys yelled and probably would have found the strength to break down the door if they hadn't have been so busy trying to catch their things before they were stepped on or taken by people walking by.  
  
"We'll get you for this ya stealin' wretches." Jack's face was almost purple from all the yelling he had been doing.  
  
"Aww don't be mad at us Jacky boy. Here, in return for giving us a nice new home, howabout we give u a nice new pair of shoes?" Hades flung one shoe out the window and we all laughed hysterically when it hit him smack dab in the head. After that our missiles were aimed at the boys who were still trying to open the doors. They stopped rather quickly.  
  
Finally, at sunset the boys stopped banging on the doors, which was a good thing because we had nearly run out of things to throw at them. They muttered and sweared, until finally one of them suggested that they go to Brooklyn for the night.  
  
When the last of them had gone we threw the remains of their things out the window, except for the few things that we needed, like blankets, brushes, a few of the smaller pairs of pants and shirts, and a few towels that we could use in the washroom.  
  
"I guess now is when we should really start cleaning." I said as I turned to look at my friends who were all still grinning broadly from our rather brutal victory.  
  
"Yep, let's get going then." Rae smiled as she picked up a broom.  
  
A/N: I know that this isn't exactly realistic, but I think it's funny, so why not? 


	4. chapter 4

Disclaimer: once again I would just like to say that none of the original newsie characters belong to me. They were all made up by Disney, or whatever. Also, the girl newsie characters all belong to themselves, and Crow belongs to Singah.  
  
AthenaHunteress: sure, you can be in my story. Just give me a description of what u look like, and tell me what your newsie name is and I'll get you into the story.  
  
Singah and Hades: you both need to be patient. This isn't a complete lovey- dovey story, so calm down. You'll get time with your guys a little later.  
  
  
  
It was nice to finally have a roof over our heads. It had been over a week since we had slept in actual beds, and once we had finished cleaning a bit the first night we all slept long and sound. Of course the next day we had to get up to go sell papes, but we all went a little later in the morning so we could avoid the boy newsies. We lived like this for about three days before we had any trouble from them. But when it did come, it wasn't expected.  
  
That day I had only bought 50 papes cause I wasn't in a good selling mood. I was done before all the others so I headed to the lodging house by myself to get some extra sleep in. As I turned the corner and walked down the street everything seemed normal, but when I walked up the steps and into the building, something seemed wrong. It was overly quiet, and a bit too dark in there. Then the door slammed shut by a hidden newsie. That was when I realized that I had walked into a trap.  
  
"Hey, dere's only one of 'em" as my eyes adjusted to the dark I could see it was that guy named Racetrack. This was the first time I had seen him without a cigar, probably because we had thrown all of his out when we took over.  
  
"One's all we need to get them to listen," the guy with the eye patch, who I heard someone call Blink, pointed out.  
  
This didn't sound too good to me. I wasn't quite sure what to do next. That was solved quickly enough, since Jack forced me into a chair at the side of the room.  
  
"You guys really are jerks," I glared at the small bunch of boys in the room. There were about fifteen of them, which was rather amusing, seeing as there was only one of me. What a bunch of wimps, I thought to myself.  
  
"We're jerks!!? You are the ones who stole our lodging house from us and threw all of our stuff at us out the window." I was pretty sure the guy who said that was named Mush.  
  
"We wouldn't have had to do that if you guys had just given us a chance in the first place," I growled at him. I knew that my eyes were turning greener as the minutes went by. My eyes are actually hazel, but they tend to turn a deeper green color when I get mad or upset. That had shut them up for the moment. They all grumbled and muttered amongst themselves, as if I couldn't hear what they were saying.  
  
"It's good that we got one of them, because now we can get them to leave us alone. Now we can make them agree to leave in return for getting their friend back." Jack seemed to be the one in charge as usual.  
  
"Aww Cowboy, are you sure you wanna make them leave? Some of them seemed kinda cute," Mush waggled his eyebrows at Race, who immediately agreed with him,  
  
"Yeah Cowboy, maybe we should give em a chance." At this they all gave me a quick glance. I put on my most innocent face and hoped that they would change their minds about us.  
  
They continued to whisper to themselves and by the way the light was getting scarce I could tell that it was past sunset. Just as I was wondering when the girls were gonna show up a crash was heard as the window in the washroom was broken. One of the other newsie boys went in a came back with a brick in his hand, with a note attached. It was given to Jack who read it silently and turned to the others,  
  
"They say that they're willing to talk without making any trouble about this situation." He pointed at me with his head when he said this. I just rolled my eyes.  
  
"Why don't we let them in, there's more of us than there are of them." Mush said to Jack. He gave it a moment of thought and then nodded his consent.  
  
All of the girls were let in, and they all trooped into the lodging house in a quiet manner. Hades and Lashes both started to yell at Jack, but Half gave them a look that said don't push it. It was her that broke the silence,  
  
"So what do you bums want us to do to get our friend back? We're willing to leave, but you better not go back on your word."  
  
"Well," Jack looked a little nervous, "actually me and the guys were talking, and we decided that we would give you girls a chance to prove yourselves. If you can sell enough papes then you can stay and become official newsies."  
  
"That is of course on one condition. You can't go throwing our stuff outa the windows no more." Race added. I caught the smile from Half that came from that comment.  
  
There was a moment of silence before any of us spoke. Then it was Singah who said, "You guys really are strange. Ya know if ya had just done this in the first place none of this woulda happened." Rae nudged her in the ribs before she added to Singah's comment, "Yeah, we accept those terms Jacky boy."  
  
Jack raised his eyebrows at this "You are also are gonna have to stop calling me Jacky boy. I am the leader of the Manhattan newsies and I deserve respect."  
  
"Don't push your luck Cowboy," Hades smirked, giving him a look that dared him to correct her. Jack gave an indignant look, but said nothing. Mush and Race burst out laughing, which was soon followed by the laughter of everyone else in the room. We were all relieved that this was over.  
  
* * *  
  
Later that evening we had all decided that the girls would get the smaller of the bunkrooms, and the guys would get the larger one since there were more of them. It was amusing to us when the guys spent the first half hour complaining about how we had messed up their bunks when we cleaned them.  
  
Race was talking loudly in a small group with his friends, "They just don't look right anymore. Just look at them, they're so… so…"  
  
"Clean?" Half joked. It had been a short time since the guys had accepted us all, but already some of the guys were beginning to grow on my friends. It wasn't just Half and Race, I also noticed that Hades and Mush were getting along quite well (already she was letting him put his arm around her). Lashes, Singah, Rabbit, and I were all talking with Blink and his friends Dutchy, Snitch, and a guy named Crow. They all seemed nice, and that Crow guy was really kinda cute, so all and all it turned out to be a good night. Well, at least for most of us. Jack was having a hard time trying to hit on Rae, and utterly failing at it.  
  
That night as we all retired to bed, we all starting talking about all the guys we had met.  
  
"That Mush guy is kinda cute," Hades giggled.  
  
"Naw. I disagree," Half teased, "I think Race is cuter."  
  
"I can't even tell them apart." Singah joked.  
  
"Your just jealous of our superior good looks." Lashes batted her lids while she said this.  
  
"I have an idea. Why don't you guys stop drooling over those boys out there and let me get some sleep." I said mock-grumpily.  
  
"What? Like you weren't making eyes at that Crow guy Inky!! I saw you looking at him like that!!" Rabbit as usual had been keenly observational, and it was rather distressing. Especially since she was the first one to see me blush.  
  
We all laughed and joked until finally we fell asleep in our new and permanent home. 


	5. chapter 5

Author's note: Thanks to all you guys who reviewed my story!!! And thanks for some of your suggestions on the chapter. Just as a warning, this is gonna be a "girly" chapter, so get ready for some serious cuddling!!!  
  
  
  
* * *  
  
It wasn't long until we all became friends with the guys. They were all nice to us, some a little over nice, and it didn't take much time for certain people to get attached. As the days passed we all went our separate ways to sell our papes, and then at night we would meet up again at Medda's or the lodging house. However, one day Lashes, Singah, and I got bored of our usual selling spot, and decided to go exploring. We ended up a long way from Manhattan. We ended up in Brooklyn (A/N: yeah, I know ya love me Singah).  
  
The late afternoon sun was making us all sweat, and we wandered aimlessly, selling papes, stopping every now and then to stand in the shade of a tall building or tree. We had strayed a long way from the lodging house, but it didn't matter; we were used to traveling in strange places, and we were perfectly able to take care of ourselves. Or so we thought.  
  
"Mutant baby born with three heads," I called out, easily selling three papes with the improved headline.  
  
"Rabid squirrels attack innocent park-goers last Sunday night." Singah's voice raised above the noise of the crowd.  
  
"20 foot crocodile found in sewers of Manhattan," Lashes put on her most serious face so that the people around her swamped us to buy papes. The small mob of people had taken the last of our papes for that day, so we decided to head back in the direction that we had come. But just at that moment a hand reached out and grabbed Lashes' shoulder.  
  
"I don't ever recall seeing you guys in Brooklyn before, and only Brooklyn newsies are allowed to sell in Brooklyn."  
  
At that we all whirled around, only to see that we had been surrounded by five newsie thugs with thickly muscles arms. There was no way that we could take them by ourselves, seeing as they probably had about another five more hidden somewhere in a nearby alley. Not good, I thought, we are all alone in a strange city with no one to back us up. We'll just have to wing it outa this mess.  
  
"We're gonna have to go see Spot and see what he thinks of this little situation we have here." It was the same guy who had spoken before.  
  
"Who's Spot?" Lashes batted her namesake with an innocent look on her face. This seem to startle the thug, and he stuttered as he answered her,  
  
"Uh….. He's the leader of the… of the Brooklyn newsies!!" He smiled at his triumph over the temporary confusion. We all just smiled and pretended not to be worried as they lead us down to the docks, which we had to cross to reach the Brooklyn lodging house. There were many newsies swimming since the day was so hot, and frankly it didn't seem like such a bad idea to me either. I could tell that Singah and Lashes felt the same way by the way they looked at the water, and the people who were far away from the dock, splashing each other.  
  
There were quite a few stares at us, and more than one whistle as we passed by the newsies. The leader thug approached a guy with walking stick who was using a slingshot to shoot bottles of the rail. The thug made some hand motions toward us, and the guy looked at us for the first time. His eyes were shockingly blue, almost like frozen steel. He had dark blonde to light brown hair that was almost hidden by the hat he wore titled over his forehead. He took a slow look at all of us, but his eyes lingered on Singah, who was equaling willing to stare back at him.  
  
After a minute or two of whispered conversation with Thug, who I dubbed for his big muscles and small brainpower, the leader guy stalked over to us and pushed back his cap.  
  
"So I hear that you three ladies decided to go selling papes in my territory without asking nicely first."  
  
"We didn't know that this territory was taken by other newsies, or we wouldn't a come here." I was growing impatient of being treated like a child by guys. "We only sold a few papes here, nothing that will do any damage to you or your newsies, so just let us go and we'll leave your territory." I was fuming anger, mostly because of the heat.  
  
"Well now, I just don't know about that. This is a first for me, seeing girls trying to be newsies. It's rather amusing." Spot smirked as a few of his newsies snickered at his joke.  
  
I looked over at Lashes and then to the water where still a few newsies swam about. She grinned back at me, understanding my plan. In an instant the two of us ran towards Spot, and we shoved him over the edge of the dock into the water. Right on top of two other boys. There was a moment of complete silence, and then all the newsies burst into gales of laughter. Spot made a hilarious site when he broke the surface, red faced, and puffing for air. I couldn't breathe from laughing so hard, and I could see tears streaming down Lashes' face. The only one who wasn't laughing was Singah, she bent down the rail as Spot was climbing up it and helped him onto the dock. She said something to him under her breath so only he could hear, probably an apology of some sort. He just smirked and said something back to her. She blushed and finally started giggling with the rest of us.  
  
It was a familiar voice who spoke up next "Hey Spot, I see you were trying to lay some moves on our girls here. I also see you learned your lesson." It was Jack, and none of the three of us remembered to point out the trouble he had caused us just a few short weeks ago.  
  
"Yeah, Jacky-boy. You're girls like to cause trouble, but we'll just have to see how long they stay your girls." I caught the wink he gave Singah.  
  
Jack came up and put his arm around me. I had gotten to know Jack and now realized that he wasn't such a bad guy. In fact, I really was beginning to like him, and I was beginning to think he liked me. So I just smiled and leaned my head down on his shoulder. Jack hadn't come alone either; he had brought with him Race, Snitch, and Blink. Later he explained that they came on a weekly basis to Brooklyn for a game of poker, which Race seemed to be pretty good at.  
  
We spent the evening at the Brooklyn lodging house, and mainly watched the boys play poker and discreetly tried to help our favorites win by making faces above the players that they were against. More than once during the night I saw Singah talking with Spot, and Lashes, as usual, was surrounded by guys. I mostly sat with Jack and Snitch, although a few more Manhattan newsies showed up including Mush, Rae, Hades, Dutchy, and Specs. Mostly the guys joined in on the poker game, but there was some complaint from most of the other guys when Hades sat right down on Mush's lap and refused to get up. It was a wonderful time, but at one point during the night I looked up to see a blacked haired boy staring at me intently. I remembered him as the Crow guy from when I had been taken hostage by the others. I didn't realize until now that he was a Brooklyn newsie, but it made sense since he had disappeared after that one day. I didn't really think about it anymore after that, since the next moment was filled with the noise of Rae socking Thug in the stomach for trying to kiss her. All in all it was a good time.  
  
* * *  
  
The walk home was short and filled with laughter and talk between the Manhattan newsies. When we got back to the lodging house we found it was just the same there. Half-pint and Rabbit were talking about how they had spent that day selling papes with the guys that they like.  
  
"Race bought me lunch today, and we talked for an hour before he left to go to Brooklyn with Jack. I think he likes me." Half blushed as we all joked about her and Race. He really did like her, and they spent the rest of the night talking in a small corner away from everyone else. Hades and Mush we had all given up on; they had gone out onto the fire escape and had been there for a long time, so we decided to let them stay out there. Lashes was deep in "conversation" with Dutch, and I was talking with Jack for the most part. It was deep into the night before anyone went to bed. 


End file.
